A fire on board an oil tanker off Germany's Baltic Sea coast has been extinguished

BERLIN -- A fire that broke out on board an oil tanker off Germany's Baltic Sea coast has been extinguished, authorities said Saturday. The blaze didn't spread to the ship's load.

The maritime rescue service was alerted to the fire on board the German-flagged Annika on Friday morning, and shortly afterward took all seven crew members off the vessel. Black smoke from the tanker, which was carrying about 640 metric tons of oil, could be seen from the coast.

The fire appears to have broken out in the engine room or in a storage room for paint and spread across the stern of the ship. On Friday afternoon, experts determined that the ship's condition was stable and authorities decided to have it towed to the port city of Rostock to continue fighting the blaze.

Firefighters inspected the 73-meter (240-foot) -long ship after it arrived in the harbor around 1 a.m. and found that the fire was out, Germany's Central Command for Maritime Emergencies said.